C.R.O.S. Ministries has coordinated recovery of tons of leftover produce

Less-than-perfect produce often is plowed back into the soil. But a local organization is helping it get onto dinner plates of the needy.

More than 100 agencies that help feed the hungry are part of a network created by Lake Worth-based C.R.O.S. Ministries — Christians Reaching Out to Society — that arranges gleanings, or collections of leftover fruits and vegetables from commercially harvested fields.

The "gleaning" season launched in November and about 300 volunteers already are signed up this month for three scheduled collections in Belle Glade. Palm Beach County contributes $43,000 to the program — roughly 10 percent of the program's annual budget.

The gleaning takes place at seven participating farms in Boynton Beach, Lake Worth, Belle Glade and in Palm City in Martin County. Last year, 218,000 pounds of gleaned fruits and vegetables was distributed to local institutions such as homeless shelters, soup kitchens, food pantries and senior centers.

If it were not gleaned, the produce would be plowed into the soil and essentially become fertilizer. Typically, veggies that aren't ideal for selling — misshapen eggplants, a skimpy ear of corn — are left to rot regardless of taste.

"There's so much waste, because when you harvest commercially there's always leftovers," said Viviane Fils-Aime, C.R.O.S. Ministries gleaning coordinator.

The USDA estimates that nationwide, 180 billion pounds of food goes to waste annually. That's equivalent to about 158 million pounds of recoverable food that could provide for 126 million meals, said Alex Stevens, director of the Palm Beach County Community Food Alliance, an initiative of United Way of Palm Beach County that partners with C.R.O.S. Ministries.

That food is sorely needed. Collectively, the agencies that benefit from the gleaning program serve more than 100,000 people annually countywide, said Dan Shorter, co-director of the Feed the Hungry ministry at Village Baptist Church in West Palm Beach, which handles the distribution of gleaned produce for C.R.O.S. Ministries.

The USDA Food Security Report, released in November, revealed that 14.2 percent of Florida households had difficulty putting enough food on the table. Locally, 10,087 callers to the 211 help line this year requested some type of food assistance, a 38 percent increase in the last two years.

"A lot of these calls are people looking for assistance for the first time in their lives. If you've been in the system, you know where to go, you're familiar with the social-service safety net that is out there," Stevens said, "But these are new families."

Some of those new families were donors in the past, when times weren't as rough.

"We've got people coming to our ministry that used to donate to us, who've lost their job, who've lost their home and now come for food," said Pastor Larry Gritton, of First Baptist Church of Lantana, which runs a food pantry serving 150 to 200 families a week.

His church benefits from the gleaning program as does the Caring Kitchen in Delray Beach.

"Feed them. If you can't do anything more, feed them," said Vince Canning, a Caring Kitchen volunteer. "And, yes, we have far more clients than we had two years ago. The people coming to you, they're getting by but no one has a surplus. We don't have a surplus in trying to provide for them."

Fresh produce can be pricey, and soup kitchens and shelters cannot regularly offer it on the menu, he said.

On a recent Saturday in Belle Glade, 9,000 pounds of corn was harvested for the needy. A force of 1,729 volunteers is signed up to take on the task this season.

Jim Campitelli was looking for a new volunteer venture where he could put in some "sweat equity," he said. The country club golf manager now is a volunteer supervisor.

"There are a lot of people in this day and age who have probably never picked an ear of corn, potatoes off the ground. I think they're fascinated with the idea of it," Campitelli said. "You fill a box of corn … It's an immediate thing, you've done something."

Farmers who volunteer are very generous, Stevens said, and organizers want more to take part.

"The past few years we've had a very cold winter. There were times when there was nothing because of the frost, but these farmers still came through for us and actually planted and opened up their fields when the crops became available," he said, "Even though they were struggling, too."

It's a struggle shared by many. The state Department of Children & Families reported that Palm Beach County has led the state in the increase of food stamp applicants, pointing to a two-fold jump from January 2009 to November, from 75,197 to 151,448.

"We're helping them; we're not satisfying their needs," Shorter said, "We're making a nice dent, but there's more food out there that is still going to waste."